This invention relates generally to vacuum cleaners for home or commercial use, and more particularly, to a portable vacuum cleaner which is capable of vacuum cleaning both wet and dry surfaces.
As is well known in the art, it is highly desirable for a vacuum cleaner to be capable of picking up liquid from a surface being cleaned, as well as ordinary dust and soil. An arrangement for accomplishing this is required, for example, when using a so-called "steam" cleaning device which sprays a liquid cleaning solution onto a surface such as a carpet and removes the liquid cleaning solution, together with dissolved soil, and deposits the soiled mixture in a holding or recovery tank.
One way in which this has been accomplished is by providing a machine which includes both a cleaning solution reservoir and a separate recovery tank. A pump is associated with the cleaning solution reservoir for dispensing the solution at high pressure, and a vacuum fan is associated with the recovery tank for depositing soiled cleaning solution in the recovery tank.
Since it is also desirable to make such a cleaning device relatively small so that it can be easily handled, the reservoir and recovery tanks are rather small. Accordingly, in operation of such a device, the recovery tank must frequently be emptied. In wet and dry vacuum cleaning devices known heretofore, it was necessary either to tip the entire cleaning device or to disconnect hose attachments from a removable recovery tank in order to remove the tank to be emptied. In the latter case, the attachments had to be reconnected before the cleaning operation could resume.
It is sometimes desirable to operate a vacuum cleaning device in a conventional dry mode employing either a foraminate paper bag or cloth filter to separate particles of dust and soil from air drawn into the vacuum chamber. In vacuum cleaning devices known heretofore, there has been no provision for easily and conveniently converting a wet vacuum cleaning device to a conventional dry mode of operation.
Accordingly, there has existed a need for a relatively small and effective wet and dry vacuum cleaning device which is convenient to operate and can be easily converted for conventional dry vacuum cleaning service. As will become apparent from the following, the present invention satisfies that need.